Talk:Chin Tsi-ang

The actor's name
A few comments about this actor's name:

I've come across several different romanizations. I've tried to redirect them all to this article. I've only seen it spelled "Tsi-Hang", with an "h", on a couple French sites. On this page, the site of which has other pages (by other writers) listing her in connection to The Swordswoman of Huangjiang by other names, she's referred to as Xu Qin-fang, which is quite different from the other variations I've seen, and I don't know what to make of it. I googled the name with "Huangjiang" and the only results it returned were the aforementioned page, the film's page at the IMDB, and two Spanish language pages with the same content. Based on the description of the character and the actress playing the character in the movie, it is the same person.

Every page I've seen where she is referred to as "Chi-Ang Chi" or "Chi Chi-Ang" has been in reference to her appearance as "the Amah" in In The Mood For Love, usually only listing her among its cast members, with no further information about her specifically.

Adding to the matter is the fact that as it is a Chinese name, her surname is often written first. I've written the different variations of it with her surname last. I'm not sure what the Wikipedia standard is, if there is one, regarding east Asian names, but since it's an English website, I didn't think it seemed inappropriate to write the names in western-style order. Some Chinese are consistently referred to in the West with their surnames last, while the names of other Chinese celebrities are just as soon written or said one way as the other.

There is also an issue with capitalization. Since the second part of the name after the hyphen is a word in itself, I capitalized it. But I've come to realize that the second part of her given name after the hyphen is at least as often as not left uncapitalized. I'm not sure what the reason for that is. I don't know what the standards are regarding capitalization with Chinese "middle" names.

It might be helpful if someone fluent in English who reads Chinese was able to find and include her name in Chinese characters in the article, and provide a definitive romanization, or at least explain it here, as well as the capitalization issue.Adrigon 03:07, 2 January 2007 (UTC)

I just noticed something. In the article I linked to above which refers to Chen as Xu Qin-fang, Mark Pollard is credited as the author. However, here, in another article also by Mark Pollard about the same movie, he refers to her as "Chen Zhi-gong" and nowhere does the name "Xu Qin-fang" appear...Adrigon 03:31, 2 January 2007 (UTC)

Upon further research simply googling the title "Swordswoman of Huangjiang" I've realized that the various versions of Chen's given names are sometimes conjoined as single rather than hyphenated. Such seems to be the case with Xu, which is apparently more often written as "Xu Qinfang" without the hyphen. Also, the original instance I discovered of the use of the name "Xu Qin-fang" for the star of Swordswoman at the website I linked to above lists two cast members in the film, the other being "He Zhi-gang". However, to further confuse things, I noticed that another page at the same website, which I have used as a citation in Chen's article, lists "He Zhi-gang" as an AKA of "Chen Zhi-gong" and makes no mention of the Xu variation.

I want to emphasize that all these different name variations are the same person, based on their use in reference to the star of Swordswoman and the description of the character played as well as her relation to Sammo Hung.

Anyway, having now found several instances where Xu Qinfang is used, I shall add it to the article as yet another variation.Adrigon 12:37, 2 January 2007 (UTC)

I've discovered information at a Chinese film site which lists different filmography pages for Swordswoman actors He Zhigang and Qinfang Xu, which indicates that despite my having gotten the impression from some English-language websites that they are the same person based on both names being variously cited as the star of the Swordswoman serial, they are in fact two different people. I suspect Xu is Chen's female co-star in the films, not simply another name for the same actor who played the title character. Thus I have removed Qinfang Xu as an AKA in Chen's article, although I am still reticent to include Zhigang He as an AKA.Adrigon 05:55, 6 January 2007 (UTC)


 * Thank you for your contributions to this article. I found that the Chinese name of this actress is Qian Siying (Chinese: 钱似莺; (Pinyin: Qián Sìyīng) and Chin Tsi-Ang is likely the Guangdong pronunciation of her name. But I really cannot understand why she is called Chen Zhi-Gong here. The Internet Movie Database has data for both Tsi-Ang Chin and Zhi-gong Chen, and each of them claims to be the grandmother of Sammo Hung Kam-Bo. It also lists Zhi-Gong Chen in the cast of In the Mood for Love, but Yahoo! Movies says the cast is Chin Tsi-ang. As for The Swordswoman of Huangjiang, the IMBD list both Zhi-gong Chen and Tsi-Ang Chin as the cast, but many other sources list none of them! I think that the Internet Movie Database must have some mistakes and is not reliable. --Neo-Jay (talk) 01:07, 21 November 2007 (UTC)
 * I just found that Chin Tsi-Ang's 1930 movie was Jiangnan Nüxia (江南女侠), not Huangjiang Nüxia (荒江女侠). The former version of this article must have confused these two movies! That's why we cannot find Chin Tsi-Ang in Huangjiang Nüxia's cast list.--Neo-Jay (talk) 01:37, 21 November 2007 (UTC)


 * First of all, an person who acts, no matter what their gender is, can be and often is referred to as an "actor" in English, so retitling my heading from "actor" to "actress" was kind of unnecessary.

If Chin Tsi-Ang is the most common name which she is credited as in English, then I have no objection to renaming the article (although bringing up the subject of such moves for discussion here before they are made is proper protocol and would be appreciated). The original article was titled Chen Zhi-Gong simply because that was one of her many alternate names which she was credited as, for her work in The Swordswoman of Huangjiang.

Much of the content of IMDB relating to actors, similar to Wikipedia, is comprised of submissions from its members. Because this actress's name has been translated into English so many different ways, it's not surprising the she might be credited at IMDB under different names, as different actresses. If you are a member of that site, you can submit that her various names, each with their own pages as supposedly different actresses, be merged into one filmography.

Since Chen was from Shanghai and later moved to Hong Kong as an adult, I'm not sure that the "Hong Kong naming convention" applies to her, unless she chose to apply it to herself after moving there. That seems like a minor issue but nevertheless something worth looking into.

Googling "huangjiang nuxia" along with "tsi ang chin" (with the western convention of placing the surname last) will return webpages. It's important to remember to google the various names in the western order also, which will produce more results.

Googling "Jiangnan Nuxia" returns a mere 5 results, and all of those results are from the same website. However, googling "Huangjiang Nuxia" returns dozens of results from dozens of websites, which credits the actress as the star of the film using the various romanized forms of her name which have been collected here, and cites the film as having been made in 1930. That would therefore appear to rule out the likelihood that the 1930 film in question was called "Jiangnan Nuxia" rather than "Huangjiang Nuxia".Adrigon (talk) 04:06, 21 November 2007 (UTC)


 * I just googled "lady swordfighter of jiangnan", and all the results the search returned cited the film as having been made in 1925. Therefore it would appear that 1925 is indeed the correct year, rather than the year mentioned in the one article added as a citation stating otherwise.Adrigon (talk) 04:19, 21 November 2007 (UTC)


 * First I changed the header from actress to actor per your request. Second, I don't know whether you can read Chinese. But all reliable Chinese sources of Qian Siying (钱似莺)'s biography say that she starred Jiangnan Nuxia, not Huangjiang Nuxia, in 1930. Xu Qinfang (徐琴芳), the actress in Huangjiang Nuxia, is NOT Qian Siying. They are two completely different persons. There are only 5 pages for google search of lady swordfighter of jiangnan, none of them are reliable sources. Please try to find Chinese sources. Thanks.--Neo-Jay (talk) 04:24, 21 November 2007 (UTC)
 * If you can read Chinese, please see this article. It clearly pointed out the westerners confused Jiangnan Nuxia and Huangjiang Nuxia! --Neo-Jay (talk) 04:30, 21 November 2007 (UTC)


 * It was only a comment, not a request. But anyway, if you can cite more than one source which claims that she starred in "jiangnan" instead of "huangjiang", then in that case please submit them.  If the number of sources is comparable, then the discrepancy should be mentioned in the article.  Please keep in mind that since this is the English site, English sources are preferable and if translations of Chinese sources exist then they should be used instead.

If you google the query --"lady swordfighter of jiangnan" OR "lady swordfighter of jiang nan"-- the latter having a space between "jiang" and "nan", it will return more than 3 times as many results.


 * Also, there were TWO female stars of "huangjiang". The actress who is the subject of this article was only one of those two.  Xu Qinfang was the other.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by Adrigon (talk • contribs) 04:57, 21 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Which one are you talking about? He Zhigang? If you can read Chinese, you will know that the name is apparently a Male name. --Neo-Jay (talk) 05:06, 21 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Yes, English sources is preferable as long as they are reliable. Please don't use personal websites, wiki, or BBS as sources (see Reliable sources). I have provided reliable Chinese sources, form press media and major Internet website. If you cannot read Chinese, why not wait for some Chinese-speaking Wikipedians to step in to have a look at this article? --Neo-Jay (talk) 05:00, 21 November 2007 (UTC)


 * According to the film's synopses found at various websites, there were two female stars of Huangjiang. One played the female half of the pair of traveling siblings.  The other played the thief who initially steals their donkey, leading to a sword fight between the two women before she joins the siblings on their journey.  A clip from the scene where the characters meet and do battle can be watched here.  However, since you have now indeed added more citations and I cannot in fact read Chinese, I will not attempt to challenge your claims.Adrigon (talk) 05:20, 21 November 2007 (UTC)
 * The clip does not show the actor's name. Can you give me the name? Is it 钱似莺 (Qian Siying)? --Neo-Jay (talk) 05:34, 21 November 2007 (UTC)


 * I have no information other than what I've been able to find via numerous English websites, which you claim are misinformed based on Chinese sources which people such as myself who can't read Chinese can't confirm or cross-reference because they're not in English. If you deny that neither of those actors are Chen, then I suppose I'm in no position to disagree.  And yes, I'm aware that the link I provided above was to a blog.  I simply posted that link above so that you could see a clip of the film.Adrigon (talk) 05:48, 21 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Thank you. --Neo-Jay (talk) 06:00, 21 November 2007 (UTC)

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